Surfing the Embargo

Small wonder that it has taken almost 20 years to build what they have. Another Australian surfer set the ball rolling. Bob Samin, a former oil-rig worker living in Cuba, helped Cuban surfers in Havana set up the Havanasurf website back in 1999—almost medieval in Internet terms. (Cuba—although by no means its general population—has been online since 1996, with the help of satellite technology.